I have been playing and straying about the edges of a well forested and mountainous landscape over the past few months...the largely mist obscured land of Mixed Mediums...

There are heaps of videos on YT, largely from three or so fairly distinct groups of crafters...

The first group of folk seem to live and craft in darkened cellars (might even be caves, the lighting is so poor in most that it can be difficult to tell), splashing paints and spraying inks across recycled junk mail, brushing on unknowable (they rarely show you the label) glutinous substances with dashing abandon across crowded desks piled with equipment and materials amongst which they burrow frantically in search of one thing or another...but mercifully, like me, displaying grubby fingers and short stained nails. Their videos are often unedited and very long...these crafters recycle piles of unlikely objects and found materials into often quite stunning objects of original but obscure desire, they are creative and imaginative and often gift or swap share the products of their imaginations...

Then there is the group who show off their well stocked cupboards of all sorts of desirable pastes, gels, sprays, mediums, pens, brushes,machines and markers...with long colourful, beautifully manicured hands and wrists encrusted with rings and bracelets in gleamingly decorated and furnished crafting shrines. This group often need to use tools to pick up objects as their nails do not allow them any actual finger contact with the item they are demonstrating...they never have stained fingers because they never actually touch anything. their videos have magical intros, are sharply edited to remove any hint of a glitch or wasted time...the narrative is often focused on speed of execution and completion. This group do not ever seem to have budgets that constrain them in any way. The items this group produce are often well polished and designed and are available for sale in their Etsy shops. The tutorials they offer are usually portions of the completed article, rather than the whole deal...

Then there is a third group, these souls have uncluttered work spaces with good lighting, clean and sparsely adorned fingies, inhabit crafting spaces cribbed from their living spaces and furnished with items repurposed from other portions of their lives. They produce projects that are quite often CASE'd from their YT friends. As a undefined and nebulous group they refine and add individual tweaks to the development of techniques and projects across their area of interest. Their videos are informative, often made more precise with strategic editing, but these souls have no reluctance to admit to wrong turns or glitches along the way. In fact they often use these to pass on helpful tips that may just help you to avoid similar issues.

One thing almost all of these inhabitants from the mixed medium country have in common though, even if they don't always speak my language, is their generosity, willingness to share techniques and projects, and helpfulness in answering my often inane questions about products, techniques and materials. I am grateful for them all! They all increase my knowledge and understanding. I am slowly coming to realise that there is no road map in this unchartered place, just the occasional street sign. One simply needs an enquiring mind, initiative and a mature self confidence...I am not sure yet if I am destined to become a member of any of these clans or am simply a tourist, wandering about and getting in everyone's way, agog with the splendour and richness of an unexplored and unknown country...time will tell.

Mind you, while we are on this subject, it took me quite a while to realise that very often the most profligate of MM folk are on design teams, employed by or married to a giant online craft store owner...the sort of connections that ensure a continuous supply of the newest, shiniest and most desirable of messy finger painting goodness...one lady who's demonstration of using lots of alcohol ink to "paint" with I started to watch just recently proves my point rather - she was not using large economy bottles of the stuff as would seem reasonable when producing a large, many layered canvas, but was simply pulling the ends off a multitude of Copic markers and pouring the meagre contents of each onto her art work...I struggle to purchase any Copics at all, they are close to ten dollars each here in Tasmania! I couldn't watch! Oh, I have mixed medium supply envy in such a bad way! But hey... it's ok...I will get over it in time...there is a cure, you know, for all diseases!

While waiting for that event to finally put me out of my misery, I have had to make do and utilise what I have, adding to the supplies surreptitiously from time to time and thinking hard about what I could do to produce similar results from my limited means, which in all fairness I do know is the reality for most of us in the crafting community.To this end, now my circumstances are more subscribed than when I was earning a regular and goodly wage, I have stopped impulse buying (almost!) and now think long and hard before any purchases...do I really need it, is there anything else that may be less expensive and do the job, are there any YT videos with a recipe to make at home...all of the above.

Having rambled on aimlessly about nothing, I will get on with what I originally intended to talk about...homemade stamps! A YT channel fairly new to me, Kagedfish, was making some MM backgrounds and was using a few obviously homemade stamps to add texture to her work. I commented on the video and expressed an interest in how she made the stamps, to which Karla replied that others had said the same and she would make a video showing the process...which she duly did.Just a couple of days later...this video link appeared in my subscription list..see what I mean? How cool was that? You should pop over and check the video out, she has lots of ideas for making stamps and stencils and some great low cost alternatives too...

So, anyway, today I set to and made some stamps similar to hers, not as good mind you, but using her process. I need to make myself a circle stencil with my punches, but I have made seven stamps today and I am keen to make some more as they can add interesting texture effects to backgrounds.I made mine from fun foam, of which I have a goodly supply (it comes in packs the size of a wool bale!).Karla mounts hers on cardboard panels or recycled jar lids. I don't have many jar lids that aren't attached to preserve bottles, (precious, precious things!) and the cardboard and gaffer tape versions seemed a little temporary, so I simply cut a few more rings of foam and glued these in a stack...and they work brilliantly!

Here are the layers of black foam that I used as the stamp bases, plus the leaves and the used (baseless) stamps, waiting for an application of foam glue to hold them all together...

Here is the stamp that started it all... Karla used a ball point pen to make concentric depressions in the fun foam...mine is not as good as hers as I didn't have enough circle stencils to make sufficient rings...I am going to make a stencil with my dies and punches so I can increase the number of rings on my stamp...such a cool effect! She also made wavy, more random lines on a stamp also...might just have to have a little go at one or two of them too!

Here they all are, with two on their sides so you can see the layers of foam...

The circles stamps...

The leaves...tentative images only as the adhesive was still wet and I didn't want to put too much pressure on them, but just showing that they stamp OK...

Once the foam glue had dried, I added the leaf stamps to the edges of these stenciled and sprayed book pages. I am very pleased with how well they stamp, they even clean off easily with a gentle rub with a baby wipe...

I have stamped all over these pages with all the stamps I made, using Distress permanent inks, with a little detail of gold acrylic dabber...

These pages were stamped using Distress inks, water misted before stamping on the left, and with just ink and stamped off on the right...

Here was me, thinking flip folders were firmly a thing of the past and I was asked to make a tutorial...now being asked to explain something to someone is very flattering, isn't it...so I set to and made a video and am now the proud owner of a second flip book...it turned into rather a long video as I wanted to keep it as "real time" as I could so I only chopped out or hurried through the boring and repetitive bits...

I am mentioning it here because I wanted to include the measurements of the cover, in case anyone wants to reproduce it...many crafters like to have specific and detailed instructions before attempting a project for the first time, they are listed below for anyone interested...​I also include the video, watch it here or on You Tube...

​​I have added timestamps to this video as it is a bit long, to allow a viewer to link directly to a section of interest...​

The completed cover...

The folder, open...

I added a pocket to demonstrate, and made a couple of tags from scraps...

The folder...

To get the best result you should make a file folder to suit your own requirements in regard to the size you prefer, the materials you have on hand to construct the cover and pages and always taking into consideration the dimensions of the items you wish to include.​However, the measurements I used to make this project are as follows:

2 pieces @ 6" x 7.5" or 15.3 cm x 19 cm - these form the left front and the back of the folder1 piece @ 5" x 7.5" or 12.7 cm x 19 cm - this forms the right front flap of the folder2 pieces @ 2.25" x 7.5" or 5.7 cm x 19 cm - these form the two spines (with flaps)

Score the two spine pieces at .5" or 1.4 cm along both long sides, and mitre all four corners to the score line to form the flaps

The measurements of the two pages included in the folder were:Bottom page - Imperial - 13" x 7.25", scored @ 6" and 7" on the long side...orMetric - 33 cm x 18 cm, scored @ 15.3 cm and 17.7 cm on the long side...

Today I am sharing a few pics I took in the garden yesterday.Since we started receiving some rain again in the past few months, everything has greened up and is growing beautifully...the period of drought conditions we have had in the state for the past few years really sorted out those plants which need a constant supply of water, and those that will survive drier conditions...it is a bit hard when one has been gardening all ones life, in a climate where rainfall can be relied on as a constant, apart from a few warmer weeks at the end of Summer, to have to rethink ones planting preferences...but wasting water is not the path to go down, by anyone, anywhere...I think the only one who rather regrets the increase in rain lately is Chris, who, being in charge of lawn mowing chez nous, has had to be much more active lately as the lawns are growing so rapidly...

Any how, things are looking quite lush at the moment...despite the loss of our fence planter boxes...

Seedling Foxgloves (Digitalis purpurea), are displaying a lovely range of pinks and salmon shades right along the fence line...

Foxglove detail...

Nasturtiums (Tropaeolum majus), are another wonderful self seeding plant, with a wonderful range of brightly coloured flowers...they do tend to rather take over an area, but make great ground cover plants, some climb and form a green background to the border, and all can be easily cut back or removed if they become too large or invasive.

I love columbines (Aquilegia vulgaris), and these pretty pink ones have seeded from a plant I had growing in the front garden last year...the little bee was keeping a close watch on things as I took this photo...

Our pepperberry bushes ( Tasmannia lanceolata), are growing well and have had a long flowering period...

This is a tiny lavender type which is just coming into flower...it is a very small bush and seems to be very slow growing...I have two in pots, and when in flower they make a lovely display either side of the front door...

The chives are growing thickly and flowering well at the moment, I find these also seed very readily along the border..

My angelica plant flowered last year, but I find a few young plants are growing in the space left by the original, lush and green, growing fast, more angelica tarts at Christmas!

Violas always self seed very freely, I even find them growing between the pavers on the patio and amongst the lawn...they are a wonderful range of colours and sizes, mainly in purple and blue shades, some are so tiny, smaller than violets...the tiny ones are my favourites...

The currants are doing very well... although we do not get many to pick as the birds are a bit partial to them also, and they generally get up earlier than us...these are not self seeded plants, but grown from cuttings.

I grew a couple of sage plants last year from cuttings of my old plant which was in a sunny, dry area of the garden and never did very well...this cutting, planted in a cooler place, is doing brilliantly...the flowers are lovely and I have been cutting them both to prune the plant and give me some pretty flowers in the kitchen...

A vase of pruned sage flowers...

The rhubarb crowns are well away...Tim was meant to pull me some stems last week but seems to have forgotten...we all love rhubarb crumble and if there is enough I will make rhubarb fizz, a refreshing fruity drink I have been making since I was a child...

Tim was going to pull out all the strawberry plants during Winter as they are a few years old now and need replacing, but some are still in situ, the amount of flowers on them will mean a stay of execution, I think...

Finally, a herbaceous little corner of the garden, rosemary, mint, sage and chives...the thyme is around the corner...

That's it for today..must concentrate on the next university unit which started on Monday...The Photo Essay...for which I was very glad to read I am able to use my phone camera...it looks an interesting course and I hope will help me make these blog posts a tad more interesting...

Well, Angelica finally received her travel itinerary yesterday from Sonya Stepto...she is off to Texas! ​The news caused a bit of a panic...we weren't terribly happy with her beaded hanging loop as it seemed to be a bit loose and stretchy and the beads were separating in a quite unacceptable manner...we all know how vain Dotees are, and how they have to have everything just so, especially when setting off to a new home. I had no option but to remove the (very well sewn in!) beaded cord and re-string them to ensure the tension was correct and the cord was not too loose this time.

Angelica does have a message...my word of the year "Peace", along with "2016" tattooed on her body, but as it is positioned on an area no self respecting Dotee would have photographed (they are VERY prudish), just take it as read that it is on a fairly broad area, in fact her derriere, and can be easily read by those who have the right permissions.

When everything was finished off according to Angelica's firmly expressed wishes, we had a final photoshoot in which Chris' arm was sorely tested. I was then allowed to finally secure her safely in her pearlised tissue traveling wrap bound with a length of eggshell seam binding, added her travelling documents to the postal box with her in case they are needed en route or when she arrives.One thing a Dotee cannot stand is any confusion about anything. The thought of arriving at her new destination and her reception being less than she feels is appropriate to her status is so overwhelming for a Dotee that she would probably simply refuse to go in order to avoid any embarrassing scenes...it is best to prepare the recipient with sufficient information to ensure a happy introduction...ask me how I know!

Angelica, ready for the departure lounge...overseas travel can be daunting, but she is cool and poised, as a Dotee always should be...

Angelica has left the country...en route to Texas and her new home...

While I had the supplies out on my table I made a second Dotee, for my daughter for Christmas, this time knitting her a tiny smock from a weeny leftover length of most fine and precious cream angora wool...meet Eve

Eve has a tad more colour in her dangle from some delicately hued crystals, along with a clear beaded crystal hem enhancement and a sparkly hair band. She also has a double thickness wig made from the same angora wool as her dress...tres chic tres coordinate n'es pas?